ANKARA. Recep Tayyip Erdogan has won the presidential elections in Turkey, obtaining his third term. According to what was reported by the president of the Turkish electoral commission Ysk, Ahmet Yener, the president, at the conclusion of the ballot vote, obtained 53.4% of the preferences against 46.5% of his rival Kemal Kilicdaroglu.
“Our people have relied on us again. The victory opens the door to the “century of Turkey” », declared the Turkish president, in a speech in front of his supporters who gathered in front of his home in Istanbul to celebrate the victory.
Recep Tayyip Erdogan immediately maintained a reuring margin over his challenger, Kemal Kilicdaroglu.
Turkey, the showdown: Erdogan the favourite, Kilicdaroglu changes tone and attacks the migrants
by our permanent Jordanian envoy
Erdogan will remain in office until 2028.
Street celebrations in Istanbul by supporters of outgoing president Recep Tayyip Erdogan, already following the release of the not yet definitive results of the presidential election ballot. Pro-Erdogan citizens poured into the streets waving flags of Turkey and Erdogan’s AKP party, cheering and honking horns.
A country split in two with only one man in charge. This is the picture that emerges from today’s ballot in Turkey, the first in the history of a country that has once again placed its trust in the man who, first as prime minister and then as president, imposed his own figure, leadership and political line for 20 years and is destined to remain in power until 2028. Numbers that leave behind the unforgettable father of secular, secular and republican Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. An overtaking of which the Turkish people are aware and for this very reason the trust placed in the incumbent president takes on even greater value. Yet Erdogan until the 2015 elections governed alone with his AKP party, from then on in a coalition and until today he has continued to lose support, without however this loss being sufficient to put an end to his empire. Trust in Erdogan, the fear of half the population of finding themselves without a guide in a country in constant emergency were the keys to victory, yesterday and today. Trust and fear that prevailed at the photo finish over the desire for change taken on by the challenger, Kemal Kilicdaroglu who was not satisfied with inflation, the shattered economy and the nationalist and anti-migrant paper to dethrone a leader who, for better or for worse, it has forever marked the history of this country. Even the economic crisis, the loss of value of the Turkish lira, the high cost of living, problems reaching the belly of the country have turned into a loss of votes that is not sufficient to make it lose, because the perception that no one better than him can solve the problems. At the end of a low-profile electoral campaign, characterized by an unexpected balance between posters and the waste of leaflets, Erdogan reconfirms himself in the name of continuity.
Congratulations from the other international leaders
Among the very first to congratulate Turkish President Recep Tayyp Erdogan was Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban who hailed an “indisputable” victory for his ally. The Emir of Qatar Tamim Bin Hamad wrote on Twitter: “My dear brother Recep Tayyip Erdogan, congratulations on your victory and I wish you success in your new mandate.”